Tuesday 20 December 2011

The Lucky Button

Big son has just gone out to brave the motorway to get to yet another interview at noon. At least he’s getting the interviews and second interviews, but as yet no graduate job. I’m sure children don’t appreciate the anxieties of their parents – I want the best for him, but know there is nothing I can do when he’s at this interview.

He’s continued to surprise me through his educational years getting ten GCSEs when I’d resigned myself to him getting none, these were followed by three A Levels and an AS. He graduated in the summer with a 2:1 in Business Studies and Marketing and I cried all the way home after the graduation ceremony. I think I was letting out the tension of struggling with a dyslexic child through the sausage machine of education – his reading age was 8 when he went to secondary school.

Anyway back to today, I knew he’d shout if I did it, but this morning I was tempted to press a lucky button into his hand when he left. I gave him a button once when he was scared at nursery and told him to press it whenever he felt scared. Needless to say he lost it, but I’d tried. So I’ve sent him out, tall and smart this morning with a metaphorical lucky button and a blast of Reiki. Good luck son. Maybe today is your lucky day.

Friday 16 December 2011

December being such a short month this year and Christmas coming early!

I once sat next to a colleague at work as he was making excuses on the telephone for not having completed a piece of work. In a voice without any hesitation he pronounced, ‘What with December being such a short month this year and Christmas coming early…’ We never let him forget his words, but I think I’ve started to believe them!

Finishing NaNoWriMo on 28 November, I went into a sort of shock. The post Nano decline made it impossible to write anything or even think logically. I may have completed 50,000 plus words in November, I hope coherently, but I haven’t written hardly anything since.

Following the Nano shock came Christmas panic. I have now written a family newsletter, 144 cards and purchased all of the presents. Phew! Now I wonder why I set myself such impossible targets. The quilted Christmas table runner I began before Nano still needs 75 gold stars stitched into it. I am also making a quilted mat for my Mom – needless to say it is nowhere near finished and the one I planned for my sister not even started. Mmm revision of goals needed perhaps?

I’m also helping a friend with her family tree – no pressure, she wants to give it to her son on his 50th birthday at the beginning of February! However, this one lights me up, I love tracing family trees. Gold stars may lose out to ancestors.

My diary for 2012 lies empty, not because I haven’t anything to put into it, but because I need to sit down and transfer everything over. Last day of term today – I wonder if I could trust my eight year old to write in all the birthdays? He’s just graduated to pen at school and his handwriting is far better than mine. He was star of the week for a poem – A recipe for Christmas – I can’t tell you how proud I was, particularly as he wrote the lot in class so the teacher couldn’t claim parental assistance. Maybe he has a few of my genes and we do have Browning ancestors!

Anyway less rambling. If I don’t get around to blogging again before Christmas, I wish you all a Merry Christmas.